This
is a section through the old building's central 4 bays - here its west
street-level half is a single full-height volume and its east half is
horizontally divided.

Summary:

L0 west-half (left): Art Gallery or large shop.

L0 east-half (right) semi-basement: night-club
"De Trut".

L1 east-half (right) entresol:
"Lettermagazijn" enclave.

L2 enclave 'Glazed-Court' (with roof-lit
centre).

L3 enclave
(surrounds L2 light-well)

Note:

North
and south of its four centre bays the building's west half includes shallow
L1 entresol floors, but its east half is more complex: north of centre is
the Company's full height entry-hall, south is a clutch of L1 rooms [presently
included in the "South Entresol" enclave].

.

BILDERDIJK OLD-BUILDING HOMES &
STUDIO-APTS

[written 2006 - info re mid 1990s]

In this section we will move upwards through the Bilderdijk old building's three living-space levels.

Bilderdijk's
L1 is confusingly split between east and west portions of different height - its
L2 / L3 floors are constant in level across the whole building. The west half of
L1 (over a sami-basement) is lower and thus its apts are normal height, the east
half is over ground-level shops and is thus 'entresol' ("half-height
floor"). On L1 are the most radical apt transformations: its two enclaves
have each coalesced into a huge single family home.

On L2 and L3 many apts typify Tetterode's smaller living-spaces:
one window-bay single-volume with a 'platform' mezzanine.
Among these are those of special significence: for instance Rein's apt [bd-L2
"Glazed-Court" enclave] is a very complex example of the type and will also serve to
illustrate an aspect of design-development that is typical of these improvised
dwellings. Though many L2 and L3 apts are typical their enclaves are not -
both their layouts are influenced by the Bilderdijk building's width and the
consequent size of its enclaves, and secondly a huge light-well that removes the
centre of L3 and provides for L2 a central lit court (the
"Glazed-Court").

In
the 1990s Bilderdijk's living-spaces totalled 32, when revisited in 2008: 29. In this section we will
visit 26 of these, some recorded in two states of occupation. When
re-visited in 2008
several of these spaces were substantially changed by new users and two whole enclaves had been
transformed into single family homes - the total number of spaces was thus
reduced - an increasing tendency in recent Tetterode:

In the 1990s
both the
"Lettermagazijn" (bd-L1/lm) and the "South
Entresol" (bd-L1/eS) were enclaves, each with three living-spaces. When
re-recorded in 2006 and 2008 the organisation of bd-L1 had substantially
simplified and both enclaves had become single huge
apts:

Bilderdijk
level-1 contains two enclaves: the "Lettermagazijn" and "South Entresol", and a large
independent apt known as the "North Entresol".

Level-1 is complex - the floor is fragmented into two areas by two intrusive and assymetrically placed
street-level 7m-high voids: the Tetterode Company Entrance Hall in the block's
NE corner and its former show-room across the centre of its W side. Furthermore the floor
has two levels: its Courtyard-facing east side is over
a semi-basement and thus lower - consequently supporting normal height room spaces;
the two 'entresol' floors on its street-facing side are over
ground-level shops and thus shallower "in-between floors".

Spread
along behind the Courtyard's east facade is the "Lettermagazijn"
enclave - in the normal height space over the semi-sunken "Trut"
nightclub. A row of magnificent rooms culled from the factory's letter-type
store.

The so-called
"South Entresol" was (when recorded in mid 90s) an enclave
of three apts with a shared social-space/kitchen. It is confusingly named since it occupies the building's full width and thus only its west half is
actually an 'entresol'. It is entered from the building's south-east stair into
the lobby of its east portion, which comprises one apt and the enclave's shared
space. The lobby contains the east portion's elaborately glazed doorway and a stair
rising to its shallower west portion, the 'entresol' proper, comprising two
apts; there is also a weirdly located and inconspicuous door into the Lettermagazine
enclave's south end.

The
"North Entresol" living space is not an enclave, it does not, like its
southern twin, extend beyond the entresol's boundary which here is filled with a single
isolated apt, confined to half the building's width by the
building's north-stair and the 7m high Co. Entrance Hall beyond.

These west-front
"Entresols" were designed as apts
(for factory staff) [1]. Even though their spaces are now re-divided by new walls,
their floor height, enclosure and seperation, window-style,
service-installations, (and perhaps more subtle traces of intention and use),
convey a sense of domesticity completely absent in Merkelbach; which achieves only 'hostel-floors' in Hartcamp; and
is otherwise in Bilderdijk reliant on the 'family-like' cohesion which results from social autonomy and isolation
(Lettermagazijn enclave) or centralised physical/social focus and relative isolation ('Glazed-Court' enclave bd-L2).

Foot-Notes
:

Their analogue is
the DE LOODS 'worker's house' [ref:]
and to less extent its Customs Office [ref:], and the
SILO's Centre-Stair offices [ref:].

SOCIAL CHANGES IN THE
BILDERDIJK ENCLAVES[written: 2010]

When visited in 2008 the
most obvious expression of the burgeoning needs of Tetterode's young families -
the enlarging of apts by amalgamation of neighbouring spaces (lowering its
population of adults and raising that of children) - was the transformations of
the Lettermagazijn [bd-L1/lm] and the "South-Entresol" [bd-L1/eS] from enclaves to single
huge family homes. I re-recorded the Lettermagazijn but was excluded from the
now totally "private" South Entresol, one of several indications that
the Collective is evolving towards a 'co-operative of private homes'.

In
the centre, with its windows opening to the Courtyard are the 4 rooms of the
"Lettermagazijn" enclave [bd-L1/lm]. At the south end [plan rt] is the
"S Entresol" enclave [bd-L1/eS]. At the north end [plan lft] is
the "N Entresol" apt [bd-L1/eN].

In 2008 this enclave was re-recorded after it had become a single
living-space. Thus in this case it is not a matter of comparing old and new
versions of the enclave's shared facilities and its three apts since all these are now
joined as parts in a single home. The recordings of this independent home will thus be shown together after the 1990s
enclave below.

[written
1994:]

This is the most
serene and elegant of Tetterode's enclaves. From the outside its row of big
windows dominates the south side of the courtyard - but from within it is so
hidden that a resident two floors above claimed not to know of it.

It was built as the
type-foundry's 'letter-store': a single rectangular space half the building's
width (19m x 10m x 4m). All the floor-surface - including the long mezzanine
gallery along the inner side of the big room and its jetty-like extensions
towards the windows - was crowded with rows of shelved cabinets filled with lead
type specimens, In spite of the high quality of its fittings (including an
african hard-wood floor of Iroko wood) the space was packed, dark, painted olive
green.

In 1986 three people
removed all the type-cabinets (yielding much clean planking) and changed it to a
row of four big rooms: building dividing walls along the centers of the three
promontory galleries and between their twinned supporting posts; and walled out
a common access space beneath the mezzanine, joining the three apts with a
social kitchen and a completely tiled 7m▓ shower/wash-machine cell with
seperate wc.

The
Lettermagazijn enclave has entrances at both ends, but finding them is puzzling.
Its north entry is inside an anonymous door at the courtyard's NW-corner: hidden
round the angle of a small dark passage is a locked door whose little window
faces stair-treads - if one can gain admittance here one will emerge into the
centre of the enclave's beautiful kitchen under its yellow gallery steps. Its
south entry is inside the locked [bd-L1/eS] S-Entresol's foyer where ones
curiosity must resist an over-grand stair plus a facade of coloured glass and
notice a dull little locked door - if one gains admittance here one is finally
inside the enclave. It opens into a cornered passage into a long low-lit space,
so 'within' that "hallway" is too preliminary a term,
"corridor" too active and cold for this common place that lies behind
all the rooms...their 'exchange-space'. A comfortable sense of shared privacy
and secure enclosure pertains here; it seems a 'subterranean' distance to the
'outside' - contradicted by views, through 1970's shop doors, of magnificent
rooms with vast end-windows.

The shabby left-hand door
(routinely locked) is the Lettermagazijn's south
entry. The door to its right (also locked) is the lobby's exit onto Bilderdijk's
south-stair [see bd S-Stair]. At
extreme right is the entry to the S-Entresol enclave.)

(The
stair rises to the 'entresol' portion of the S-Entresol enclave.)

.

bd-L1/lm
"Lettermagazijn" ENCLAVE

.
ENCLAVE
(in 1990 & 1993)

LETTERMAGAZIJN
ENCLAVE: COMMON-SPACE

(pic
8-90 / to SSE)

The
common space along the enclave's inner side, that can be entered (if one
finds the ways) at either end, & which serves like an inner street
the three courtyard-facing apts and kitchen, plus a bathroom/wc.

View
towards its south end, past Gert-Jan and Gemma apts, to the exit near the
S-Entresol.

LETTERMAGAZIJN
ENCLAVE: COMMON-SPACE

(pic
8-93 / to NNW)

View
to the N, past Gemma and Gisa apts. Across the
far end is the bathroom, but a right turn enters the Kitchen, whose centre
stair leads down to a Courtyard-connecting passage.

.

ENCLAVE
KITCHEN (1986 -) (bd-L1/lm / N-end - 1 bay)

The shared kitchen
and dining space at the N-end is more enclosed than
the apts: Courtyard workshops claim the lower part of the big window and its
upper-portion is shaded under the
bridges. The dominating feature is a monumental and clearly conceived
wooden stair, up to the gallery and down to its 'hidden' courtyard north entry.

ENCLAVE KITCHEN:
(pic 8-90 / to W)

At
the back left is the entry from the common-space; at the rear is the wall
and door of the wash/wc room. The central stair ascends to a gallery and also descends to a locked door, exiting into a narrow passage to the
Courtyard's NW corner.

ENCLAVE KITCHEN:
(pic 9-93 / to NNW)

The
strident colors of 1990 have been tamed and subtleised.

ENCLAVE KITCHEN:
(pic 9-93 / to NE)

From the entry.

ENCLAVE KITCHEN:
(pic 9-93 / to NW)

ENCLAVE KITCHEN WINDOW:
(pic 8-90 / to NNE)

The kitchen window looks over
the N-end workshops and is thus smaller than the rest - too high up the wall
to be afford a horizontal view. What is window in the three apts is here a
tiled wall behind sink and worktop capped with a long kitchen shelf.

In ####,
after Gisa had left the north apt-space, the other two Lettermagazijn inhabitants,
Willy and Geert-Jan, transformed this 1990s enclave into an independent family home.
By 2008 this functional melding seems to have provoked only one structural-spatial change:
an extending of their mezzanine sleeping space (in what was the north-apt), through
the dividing wall onto a portion of the kitchen mezzanine; other changes
are non-structural, consisting of redistribution of the family's accoutrements between the
three previously separate apts.

I will show the
five main spaces continuously, but in a similar sequence to the above: 1: the
'connecting space' (with bathroom and wc); 2: the N-end space kitchen is almost
unchanged but its mezzanine has begun to be developed; 3: the N-centre space is now Willy's work
room, with the parents' bedroom on the mezzanine; 4: the S-centre space is now the
family living-room, with Geert-Jan's work-space on the mazzanine; 5: the S-end
space and mezzanine is now the childrens' space - the younger child its east
portion, the older has the mezzanine.

The so-called "South Entresol" is accessed through a locked door on the first
landing. It comprises three apartments and a shared kitchen/eating-space with an added platform 'for guests'.

Confusingly, the
"Entresol" is only part of the enclave. Up a short stair from the entry lobby are the two apts
(Marion's and Ton's) that occupy the
"Entresol" proper, the 'in-between floor' overlooking the Bilderdijkstraat, squeezed over shops in the
building's SE corner. This has long been domestically occupied - before the squatters the Tetterode caretakers' families lived in rooms which overlapped these
present living-spaces, which show a ghost plan of walls on the 90 year old floor. The central shared kitchen and the third apt
(Martine's) flank the Lettermagizijn east of the entresol floor, in normal height Tetterode spaces.

In 2006 I briefly
visited the "S-Entresol" and discovered it had been transformed by new
occupants into a single huge family home.

The
"South Entresol" is a confusing label for an enclave which
combines within its boundary the
S-Entresol's two apts with conventional
full-height spaces on the building's east side (an apt and the shared kitchen).

SOUTH ENTRESOL LOBBY:
EAST-LEVEL ENTRY DOOR
(pic 26-4-08 / to E)On
the right is the flamboyant entry to the S-Entresol independent family-apt
(formerly the S-Entresol enclave of 3 apts).
The door on its left is the lobby's exit to Bilderdijk's
south-stair [see bd S-Stair]. (The
extreme-left door is the Lettermagazijn's south
entry.)

SOUTH
ENTRESOL LOBBY: STAIR TO UPPER W-FRONT ENTRESOL ROOMS
(paste-up 2-pics 26-4-08 / to SW)
The stair up to the west-side 'entresol' portion of the
enclave.

The
sitting/dining room for the enclave. Through the arch is its kitchen. Overhead
is a 'guest' platform. The three high windows (shared by the platform) open onto
an open 'loggia' on Tetterode's S-facade (ref Marion's apt below).

Martine's 1-bay space is a typical small 'Tetterode factory' platform apt, not in the 'real' entresol. Though included in the 'S-Entresol'
enclave and opening off its shared central
kitchen/diner, it is on the east side facing the courtyard; unlike the other two enclave apts on the Bilderdijk front, established in a unique type of
Tetterode space, pre-designed for domesticity.

In October 1987 Marion moved into a
small dark room in the centre of the Entresol, opened its wall into this
extensive space, walled a portion of the common landing for its
kitchen/entry-hall and renovated its cupboard-sized shower and WC.

This long low clearly ordered room
penetrating deeply into the building's width and opening above the street,
typifies the style of many A'dam flats, but with 2 bizarre exceptions: its
dark-red entry-hall is also a tiny cubic kitchen, and a picture-sized square
opens in its rear wall onto a subject astonishingly detached from its setting: a
dark vision of a huge-arched loggia with sky in its brows high over a chin-high
floor. An unexplained feature of Tetterode's south facade.

MARION APT: ENTRY & KITCHEN
(pic [damaged] 8-93 / to EES)

The
apt's 'front-door' (serving also as a notice board) opens directly from the
landing into a tiny kitchen/hallway - here viewed through its door into the
main living-room..

MARION APT: FROM NEAR ENTRY
(pic 8-90 / to SW)

Looking
out over Bilderdijkstraat at the S-end of Tetterode through the small windows of
the "entresol", in a space originally designated for habitation rather than factory.

MARION APT: FROM NEAR ENTRY
(pic 8-93 / to SW)

In
three years since the last visit the living-space has been rearranged and
houses more objects.

MARION APT:
(pic 8-93 / to SE)

The yellow Music Cupboard
(1993) was designed on paper and made by Rein in his workshop from new wood.

MARION APT:
(pic 8-93 / to EES)

The SE corner is a bed, a ## cubicle and a
window exit to an exterior loggia.

MARION APT:
(pic 8-93 / to SE)

At
the SE corner this small window gives access to an arched 'loggia'.

MARION APT:
(pic 8-93 / to EES)

This strange 'left-over' space opens above the enclave's kitchen through
Tetterode's SSE facad ...an arched loggia which
Marion uses as a wash-drying area, accessing it through a small window at
her apt's NE corner.

On
a brief visit to this huge new family home in 2006 I was allowed to photograph
what was previously Ton Seelen's apt [see below]. In 2008 I
revisited the "S-Entresol" to adequately record it but was
prevented (only the S-Entresol's entry lobby was
accessible as it also shelters the Lettermagazijn's south door - see above).